Paedophilia is an extremely hard subject to even think about, let alone talk or make a documentary about. Saara Hakkarainen manages in fourteen minutes to take the viewer on a journey into the mind of a paedophile – shining a light on an immense taboo and into the tortured soul of a broken young man.
Saara Hakkarainen makes it perfectly clear, from the start, how delicate this subject is. She shows how she’s instructing an actor how to stand on a balcony – a scene we will come across later in the documentary. In voice-over we hear with the actual protagonist of the movie, Aleksi, telling her why he would never dare to talk his sexuality in the open. He would never be able to get a job anywhere, or even show his face.
The actor subsequently plays the role of a normal young man, going about his life, meeting his friends and being with his family. Meanwhile the voice is telling a different story – a story in which a confused teenager discovers he finds his girlfriend’s childhood picture more interesting than her current self. And in which he realises he will never be able to lead a normal life, with a wife and children. He tells about the many times he has contemplated how everything would be way simpler if he would just take his own life and be done with it. He says it without emotion, like a mere fact.
The combination of the staged scenes and the footage – in colour and black-and-white – work well in creating a sense of loneliness and of the young man’s reality. His life is one giant role play – in which he’s forced to ignore or overcome his feelings. He’s very much aware of the fact there’s no way he can ever act on them – he will never do anything to hurt children.
Hakkarainen doesn’t overdramatise the situation, she doesn’t judge Aleksi and she doesn’t question his sexual orientation. She merely gives him a chance to open up and make us understand what it can be like to have to live this way. She also doesn’t take everything he says for granted: she wants to know why he waited so long before visiting a psychologist, for example. These critical notes underline her sincerity and heighten the credibility of the documentary.
The documentary will surely raise discussions, probably even before people have seen it, as paedophiles are often put on a par with child molesters. And it is hard to imagine you could feel any sympathy for the latter. But after seeing this documentary it would be impossible to develop at least some understanding for the predicament paedophiles are in.
Silence might help by putting them into a more human perspective.
Director: Saara Hakkarainen
Production: Aino Niemi/Pauliina Maus, ELO Helsinki Film School
Cinematography: Arttu Liimatta
Editor: Lyydia Mäkipää
Sound: Ossi Oikari
Spoken languages: Finnish with English subtitles
Running time: 15 mins
